Becky Wade's Blog, page 54

Not the post I thought I’d be writing today

I had a post drafted for today, one detailing my excitement over cataract surgery that would be happening and how my restored eyesight would be an answer to my preteen prayer so long ago. 

But alas, it was not to be. 

On the final pre-op test, my doctor discovered that I have a condition called keratoconus, which is essentially a severe steepening of the cornea. It’s apparently this, more than anything, causing my extremely bad eyesight, which has been worsening. And even if I had my (at this point) small cataracts removed, I’d still need a high prescription of glasses and contacts to see. 

To say I was devastated was an understatement. I’ve been imagining life without contacts or glasses for two solid months, not to mention the fact that since my 20s all my ophthalmologists (that would be all 2 of them in that span!), have assured me my vision would be completely corrected with cataract (lens replacement) surgery. 

I cried. 

A lot. 

But I also knew that God was in control. The one small hope my doctor held out to me was a specialist in Dallas who fits contacts for such extreme cases. Fortunately, he had an opening just three days after my disastrous pre-op appointment. 

I went into that appointment with very little hope. I mean, what could a new type of contact really do? 

Apparently, it can do amazing things!

I learned several things in that appointment. 

Scleral lenses are made to compensate for the irregular cornea shape, rendering my clearer vision than with regular contactsThey also help with severe dry eyes (which I have!)Keratoconus will not lead to blindness (which I’ve always feared!)These contacts are deemed medically necessary and in spite of there expensive price tag, our insurance covered them 100% (which was crucial since we are still waiting for insurance to decide if they will pay for the enormous damage to our home!)

Those might not seem like life-changing things to you, but they are to me! He put scleral samples in my eyes and they immediately felt comfortable. Then he did the eye exam with them in. (They weren’t my right prescription at this point because each contact is made to the specifications of the individual eye.) When he did the whole “better one or two” thing, I could see more crisply than I had since I could remember! Not only that, I was also able to clearly read the 20/20 line!

Y’all. I haven’t seen 20/20 even with contacts in years! 

He told me these contacts with give me a better quality of life—and even allow me to see to drive at night again. 

It was such a turn-around from the appointment days earlier where I’d sobbed in the exam room. 

God had a plan all along. It wasn’t the plan I envisioned (ha!)—I will still wear contacts and glasses for the rest of my life—but I will see far better than I’ve seen in years, so I can deal with the contacts. 

I’m so, so grateful my ophthalmologist sent me to this specialist. I’m so, so grateful the Lord had a plan to improve my very imperfect vision. It’s a healing through medical innovation, but a healing nonetheless. For I had begun to fear that my days driving and working on my computer were numbered. 

How has God shown you clear evidence of His faithfulness lately? 

Inspired by Scripture

This Sunday feature is brought to you by ClashVerseoftheDay.com. You may sign up to receive a beautiful photo with Scripture in your inbox each morning or view the verse each day online.

5 New York Favorites

I recently returned from a fall break trip to New York city with my two daughters! These were our five favorites from our time in the Big Apple…

1. Broadway

My 14-year-old daughter LOVES musical theatre, so Broadway was the main motivation behind a trip to New York. It did not disappoint! We saw 4 phenomenal shows while we were there. I loved them all, especially the new stage production of Back to the Future.

Playbills from the 4 shows we sawTimes Square!After we booked our trip, we learned that one of my daughter’s best friends was also traveling to NY and seeing the same show on the same night.2. Liberty Island and Ellis Island

I’ve been to New York several times in the past but I’ve never made the effort to take the boat over to Liberty and Ellis Island. I’m so glad we did that this time. I found both sites fascinating. The free audio tours were superb!

The registry room at Ellis Island 3. The High Line walking path

The city repurposed what was once an elevated train track and made it into a walking path/park/green space. An ingenious renovation! It’s lined with planting beds and benches. Also, it provides a unique view of New York from above street level which–bonus–means you don’t have to hassle with traffic or waiting at intersections. You can simply stroll and enjoy. At 1.5 miles long, it’s also just the right length. Worth the trip, but short enough to easily walk the full distance.

The High Line grants you views, like this one, of the city from above sidewalk level. 4. The 911 Memorial

I have so much respect and admiration for the thought, care, and artistry that went into the creation of the memorial plaza and pools. I read that the artist who created the pools in the footprints of where the twin towers once stood wanted to communicate the absence of what was. It does that brilliantly. The falling water is beautiful, the names inscribed around the pool are emotional. The whole area has a reverent feel. Powerful and moving.

Survivor Tree5. High tea at the Plaza

The Palm Court at the Plaza hotel has been in operation since the hotel opened in 1907. It’s the setting for a scene in The Great Gatsby and has featured in many other novels and films. High tea there was a lovely, memorable, delicious splurge!

We had a fabulous time! Have you enjoyed any of the places mentioned in this post? Do you have other favorites to recommend?

Ready for the Season Christmas Reads

It’s so hard to believe that in a few days we will be turning the calendar page to November and in a few more weeks December. In a slightly unusual move for me, I’ve been reading Christmas books in October, and really enjoying the foray into these sweet, holiday reads. In case you’re ready to deck the halls early, I thought I’d share these titles with you, too, this week. There are so many great reads out there, but here are a few that can get you in the Christmas mood. Be sure to keep reading for a book I’m giving away on Amazon starting today through October 30th — it just happens to be a Christmas read.

First up is Melody Carlson’s A Royal Christmas. I enjoyed this royal fairy tale that felt like Princess Diaries. Adelaide is living her life trying to make it to the end of law school when she receives a letter telling her she is the daugher of a king in a tiny country. She’s understandably skepticle, but decides she doesn’t have much to lose by going to see what’s possible — especially since she’s always wanted to know who her father was. What started as a far-fetched idea slowly begins to feel possible. Soon she’s on a journey that has her interacting with her father and learning more about this country and how she might be part of its future. Throw in a handsome tour guide and a quest for the truth and you hve the ingredients for a sweet story that will put you in the mood for Christmas.

The next one I enjoyed was Toni Shiloh’s You Make It Feel Like Christmas. I thoroughly enjoyed this Christmas novella from author Toni Shiloh. Starr doesn’t want to go home for the holidays for many reasons. She just lost her job making her feel like a failure when all her siblings are highly successful. Her sister is about to marry her former boyfriend. And Starr just doesn’t feel like she fits. It’s going to be a hard season. Then her oldest brother’s friend steps in and she finds herself spending time helping him market his Christmas shop. He’s inherited it from his mom and investing his holidays with her family so he’s not alone. The more time they spend together, the more sparks fly. One thing I love about Toni’s books are the richness of spiritual thread, and she does the same in this book. It might be short, but it’s rich and well layered. I thoroughly enjoyed it and recommend it. It’ll put you in the holiday mood without being overly light and fluffy.

Finally, when I need a break from writing, I’ve been enjoying Sarah Monzon’s All’s Fair in Love and Christmas. It reminded me of You’ve Got Mail mixed with other fun romcoms. There’s aspects of a crazy Christmas competition combined with heart and a need for both the hero and heroine to get the promotion that will go to the winner. And both are great characters. It’s a truly enjoyable read filled to the brim with the best of Christmas and pure fun.

To help you get in the Christmas mood, I’m giving away one of my Christmas books A Promise Born today through October 30th on Amazon. I love this story because it’s set with the Navy WAVEs at the second most top secret project of WWII. There’s also a Christmas scene at the … Wait… I probably shouldn’t share that part. I do love this book.

Also if you’re looking for a Christmas read, I’d be grateful if you check out We Three Kings. You can find links to your favorite retails by clicking the link or the image. When you read this or any book, if you’d take a moment to leave a review, I’d be grateful. So much of the way that readers discover our books is through visibility — and the algorithms partly determine visibility through the number of reviews. It can be a slow process to get to the magical number of 50 and 100 on Amazon. It doesn’t have to be a full review. Even leaving stars that represent your impression of the book is helpful. Thank you! And to celebrate, I’m giving away one more copy below.

Have you read any of these Christmas books? What’s your favorite Christmas read?

a Rafflecopter giveaway

Cozy Creativity

Hi friends and happy Wednesday! 

I’m putting together my workshops for the writing retreat I host and teach twice a year. This year we’re meeting in December in Virginia Beach. Christmastime at the beach. I can’t wait! I’m already daydreaming about the various decorations we’ll have. I’m thinking lots of whites and soft blues, maybe even soft pink. We were in Cracker Barrel last night and they had a beautiful tree decorated in whites, silver, and soft pinks. I normally wouldn’t gravitate towards pink hues, but with the white lights, it was beautiful. If you’re attending my retreat just ignore this last spoiler sentence. But I plan to bring a small tree to decorate and have by the beautiful fireplace. 

Why do I take time to decorate an Airbnb for a writer’s event? Because I believe our environment and our surroundings have an impact on our moods and us in general. Think how you feel in an overcrowded and musty garage filled to the brim with storage and handyman or handywoman objects. If boxes are piled high, they can have that “closed-in” feel. Contrast that with a house overlooking swaying seagrass and the tumbling waves. Where everything is in its place, the space is open and filled with cozy candles—the flames glistening off the silver Christmas balls on the tree. That’s what I want all my attendees to feel when they arrive, that they’ve walked into an oceanside winter wonderland. Why? So that they feel comfortable, cozy, and inspired. Yep. Inspired. 

Inspired? Yes. I believe your environment, especially one near nature can stir your creativity. Something happens in my brain when I’m at the beach. My stress evaporates (hence my kids say I need to live at the beach because I’m a “stress bunny.” Not proud of that fact but they’re right). But I digress, when I’m at the ocean, it settles my mind, and for whatever reason, my creativity blooms. I can’t tell you how many times I’ve sat writing furiously on the beach on my legal pad with a pen. Stories and ideas just tumble forth, and I can’t ignore them and write later because the words are pouring forth and to be perfectly honest, I’d forgotten half of it by the time we come off the beach after sunset. 

I teach writing, literature, and speech to homeschool high schoolers one day a week and this week one of my students gave a speech on the effects of nature on our health. Some of the facts and statistics she shared only confirmed my belief that being near or in nature helps your mind, body and I think your soul. Why? Because God is the great Creator. He called creation into being and when we spend time in God’s creation, we (at least I) greatly feel His presence and where does creativity itself come from? God. He is the great Creator and we’re made in His image. Our creativity blooms when it’s anchored in our Lord. There are lots of ways to spend time in nature—go for a walk, go to a park, go hiking, or sit on your porch with a cup of coffee and your Bible. Sit in the silence (this is a hard one for me because my brain likes to go non-stop). Being still and soaking up quiet time in the Lord’s presence will guide you in your life, and if you’re a writer, in your art. 

Question for you: 

What stirs creativity in your life? 

As always, thanks for joining me this week 

Best, 

Dani

Standing in the Gap

A few years ago, my husband and I made a pilgrimage of sorts to see the Sycamore Gap Tree, a popular landmark in Northern England. Daylight was fading and rain was falling as we made our way along an uncertain path that, thanks to my husband’s keen navigation skills, led us up and down wet hills and slippery footpaths along Hadrian’s Wall until we reached one of the most photographed trees in England. In fact, The Northumberland National Park Authority said the site was its “most-photographed spot.” It is estimated that the tree stood in a dramatic dip in the landscape for at least two centuries.

Photo by Brian Klassen

It was beautiful, and well worth the hard walk in the rain to get there.

Though long sought after by British hikers and photographers, the tree was made internationally famous through the 1991 film, Robin Hood, Prince of Thieves, starring Kevin Costner, when it earned the nickname “Robin Hood’s Tree.”

We were saddened to learn that this popular landmark has recently been cut down in a heartless, or at least thoughtless, act of vandalism. We join with many others in mourning the tree’s loss.

photo by the National Trust

“Robin Hood’s tree” is no longer standing in the gap, but I am very grateful to have been there while it was.

Julie Klassen at the Sycamore Gap Tree, circa 2018.

Have you been there? If not, is there a similar landmark near and dear to your heart?

Club Deb is (was) in the house!

I first posted here about my dear Club Deb friends in 2015. We are a group of friends who’ve been palling around ever since we were young wives and moms raising our kids in the same small town. If the friendships I write about in my novels seem idyllic, these gals are the reasons why. Loving, caring, thoughtful, selfless, kind, supportive…those are just a few words that describe these beautiful women.

We’ve been friends in various combinations for close to thirty years, and Debbie A (beside me in the photo below) was our backyard neighbor for many years, but I think this is the first photo we have with all six of us together in 2004.

Here we’re celebrating my 50th birthday at YiaYia’s in Wichita. Left to right, Debbie J, Deb B, me, Elaine, Bev, and Debbie A.

With our husbands in 2007:

And more of Club Deb through the years. It’s fun to watch our hairstyles (and color), fashions, and weight (ugh!) vary as the years go by.

Even though I moved away from Kansas where all the Debs still live, Club Deb is going strong, and last week, four of the Debs made their way to Missouri to spend a few days at our house! I can’t tell you how good this was for my heart! (We so missed our Deb B who couldn’t join us this time.)

We packed so much into two and a half days! We walked on my favorite trails, sat on the screened porch and solved the problems of the world, ate at some favorite restaurants, antique shopped till we dropped, sipped hot cider around the firepit, milled flour and made homemade bread, stayed up late playing Mexican Train in our PJs… We even got tattoos! (Don’t worry! The tats were temporary—but these friendships are forever.)

Part of the secret to our enduring friendship is that we have so much in common—husbands we adore, precious children and grandchildren, similar interests and beliefs. But there are many things we don’t share in common, yet still we remain friends. The one thread that binds us together literally forever is the strong faith in Christ we share.

I’m so grateful for the new friends God has put in my life since we made the move to a new state, but there’s something incredibly precious about these friendships that go back so many years and our shared history.

I’d love to hear about your longtime friendships. What do you think are the secrets to sustaining friendships over the decades?

Make new friends, but keep the old.

One is silver and the other’s gold.”

Inspired by Scripture

This Sunday feature is brought to you by ClashVerseoftheDay.com. You may sign up to receive a beautiful photo with Scripture in your inbox each morning or view the verse each day online.

Mother-Daughter Day

This past weekend was ACU’s Homecoming, and my daughter came home to enjoy the festivities. She is currently working on her PhD at Texas A&M and is so busy, that she doesn’t get away very often to come see us. Yet, for the last several years, Bethany has made a point to visit for Homecoming. She always warns me in advance that I need to get my writing done early in the week because she intends to hijack me for a mother-daughter day filled with alumni activities. Girl time is rare for us, so I happily oblige.

The first event of the day was the Homecoming Parade. There were horses, floats, antique cars, balloons, and the marching band. Since my daughter is as much of a book nerd as her mama, our favorite float of the day was sponsored by one of the sororities that featured a Beauty & the Beast theme with our favorite book-loving Disney Princess.

Next was a chapel service with lots of great worship and an inspiring speaker. Chapel let out at about the time that the solar eclipse was happening, so everyone milled about outside afterward with their ACU solar glasses to enjoy the phenomenon. In Abilene, we didn’t get the complete solar coverage, but we still got to see all but a slim crescent of the sun covered.

We didn’t have anything on our schedule until the musical that evening, so Bethany asked if we could walk around campus and see buildings and spaces that had changed since she’d last visited. Since she hadn’t yet seen one of the new spaces in the library, I figured we could go there first. Like many university libraries these days, it can be hard to find the actual books. The main floor hosts a coffee shop, our IT support center, and various collaborative spaces for students to gather. All of the books were moved to the lower level years ago and housed in space-saving shelving units. It seems wrong somehow not to be met with the welcoming sight of books upon entering a library, but in an age where the majority of information is stored online instead of on pages, I can understand the change.

A few years ago, however, ACU renovated a space on the library’s main floor as a dedicated reading commons. It has a glass wall/display case that separates it from the main coffee shop space and it is filled with comfy chairs and even a couple of bean bags. The thing I love most about it is that it is focused on fiction. This is highlighted beautifully in the decorative glass wall overflowing with the signatures of famous novelists and poets. If you enlarge the photo below, you’ll see signatures such as C.S. Lewis, Jane Austen, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Harper Lee, Robert Frost, Maya Angelou, J. R. R. Tolkien, and Madeleine L’Engle among many others.

I just love this space!

We ended the day by attending the homecoming musical – a production of Matilda. It seemed a fitting end to the day to enjoy the musical story that celebrated a little girl who loved to read books.

Did you see the eclipse last Saturday?
Have you noticed libraries cutting back on books to make room for technology?
What is something fun you did last weekend?

It’s Almost Christmas Reading Time

Every year I look forward to November and December, when my reading takes on a seasonal theme. I used to just read Christmas-themed books in December. Then I moved to “after Thanksgiving Day.” Now, I give myself two entire months! 

Not that I only read Christmas books during those weeks, but I do make them a priority. So I thought I’d share with a you a few I’m looking forward to reading. 

My True Love Gave to Me by Karen Witemeyer

Technically this is a short story—and as such will likely be the kick-off to my Christmas reading season. I always look forward to Karen’s stories in any form. 

O Little Town by Deborah Raney, Janyre Tromp, and Amanda Wen

Christmas novella collections are some of my favorites—especially when they are connected by place. This one is contemporary stories. I didn’t get to it last year, but I will in 2023! 

Christmas Bells and Wedding Vows by Jody Hedlund, Lacy Williams and Misty M. Beller

Another novella collection—this one historical. These are all Christmas marriage of convenience stories. 

The Meaning in Mistletoe by Rachael Bloome

Last year I read The Clause in Christmas, Poppy Creek series book 1. I loved it so much that I read books 2 & 3. I got ready for book 4—The Meaning in Mistletoe—around the beginning of September. Since it is another Christmas book in the series, I put it aside to read during the season. This is a charming series! 

Star of Wonder by Angela Hunt

This isn’t a novel but an advent devotional. I choose a new advent devotional each year and I’m looking forward to this one! 

Of course I have many more options out there, but these are the first ones on the list for 2023. 

Do you read Christmas-themed books in November and/or December? Is there one you are looking forward to this year?